"This is really your first time," The enforcer echoed back something that really didn't strike Jace as a proper reply, before he brought his face a bit closer behind the screen, studying Jace.
His scrutinizing took a while, and ended with a smile on his lips.
Jace didn't understand why. Did the Enforcers assume they were such big shots, that not having interacted with one was such a big deal?
According to his memory, that shouldn't be the case. Most Contracted Denizens of Neo City like him, definitely never looked forward to meeting one.
It was an interaction that could easily go horrifyingly wrong.
You could get executed on the spot, for a crime you had no idea you were charged with, you could get arrested, high-value pieces and gadgets could get confiscated for a lot of reasons…Illegal possession of it, contra-bound status, stolen status…just to mention a few.
The enforcer's behaviour was extremely odd, but who was he to judge? This was his first time meeting one.
"I will give you a concise overview of how we operate, seeing as it's your first time and you are quite curious about the whole thing."
I didn't express being curious about it, Jace corrected in his head, not bothering to do so vocally.
The Enforcer was on his own wavelength obviously, and he couldn't be bothered to try to get him to his.
Highly doubted he could even pull that off if he tried.
"As an Omega Denizen, no matter how low your denizen status may be you are obligated to certain services," Enforcer Kijo began to explain. "The most essential of these services is Enforcer protection."
Jace nodded.
"However, the level of protection and resources OMEGA will readily provide for these services, varies with denizen tier."
Jace nodded once again, impatient for the Enforcer to arrive at the bit where he clarifies if they are already working on getting his daughter back. This much about protection and resource allocation level, he was quite familiar with.
"Having made a report that claims a threat on your dependent and demands the protection service provided by us, Enforcers.
A report has been logged in on ORIS [Omega Response Intelligence System], and assigned an appropriate tier, both based on threat level, urgency, and your denizen tier."
"So it's being attended to already?" Jace asked, impatient.
"Not at the moment, your report has been assigned a Tier 2 level of significance…a code green log. There are currently 131 active code green logs in District 17. Your report will be attended to and addressed to an optimal level, assigned resources may allow, when the earlier logged codes have been adressed"
It took Jace a moment to process the info.
There were several things off; Tier 2 didn't sound like a high enough tier, neither did being number 132 on active logs, and worse off, addressed to an optimal level definitely didn't sound the same as resolved.
The Enforcer studied him in silence as he processed the info, discussion from the other Booth reaching theirs in barely audible whispers, his mind wanted so desperately to listen in on those whispers, delay arriving at that inevitable conclusion for as long as possible.
A luxury Jace shut off with a huff, balled his fist, and asked the inevitable.
"How long exactly till my log is attended to?"
"Could be anywhere between 36 to 65 hrs. Each code green log is allowed a maximum Enforcer attendance of 30 minutes."
"Hold on a bit," Jace snapped mid Enforcer talk. "What do you mean by a maximum Enforcer Attendance of 30 mins…Like you guys will definitely resolve it within at most 30 mins."
Perfect man scoffed. "We are Enforcers, not miracle workers."
"We will initiate a response with engageable resource appropriate for your tier and generate a response report as we progress, once engageable resources are exhausted. This includes both tangible resources like firepower, Ether Charge and intangible resources like Enforcer reasoning, discomfort, and exhausted time.
We will cease response and send you a response report up to the level of progress cessation, detailing how allocated resources were expended, and you may not log a new issue until your cool down period of 300 hours is over."
"So this is all some performative art!' Jace snapped. Red string of words flashed across the screen.
ALL FORMS OF ASSAULT ON PERSONNEL WILL BE PROSECUTED APPROPRIATELY
He fumed on in silence.
"This is fair," Enforcer Kijo declared, adding to his annoyance. "You are barely a denizen. This much attention is generous of OMEGA."
Jace let his fingers drum erratically across the desk, trying to tame his rage.
The Enforcer studied him in amusement; it was obvious he took delight in showing Contract-Level Denizen how nonsensical they were to the system.
…of course, a heirloom is a thing of extreme importance," barely audible whispers from the booth to his right reached him.
The same booth where the lady that her butt had held more interest to the Enforcer than his case was.
What those words implied caught his attention; he listened on.
"It's logged in as a yellow code. We will certainly recover your heirloom before the day's end." The Enforcer in the booth declared.
Jace's brows perked up, "What Tier is code yellow ?"
"Three," the Enforcer replied him with barely suppressed excitement.
"That's higher than mine!"
"Yes."
"WTH!!!" Jace swore. Enforcer Kijo grinned.
"It…It's just a robbery," Jace snapped, pointing his fingers towards the booth.
"My daughter was kidnapped, my freaking daughter was taken and she was only assigned a Tier 2 green code!"
Those familiar strings of words about assault flashed again as the Enforcer craned forward.
"All Process Enforcers are trained to assign log codes with a near negligible margin of error while judging cases presented across multiple parameters." He elaborated smugly.
"Are you saying my colleague's assessment is wrong, or are you insinuating that there is some form of bias in the code assigned to you?" He asked.
Jace could sense a threat; he was in really dangerous territory.
Chances that the constitution wasn't what it was from when law enforcers weren't genetically engineered were pretty high.
His instincts were blaring strong warning signals that there was a pretty high chance that the next few words that left his mouth would have a very strong correlation with his freeman status.
Damn, even silence might have its own implication. His mind analyzed as the Enforcer's grin turned vile.
I need time…I need more time to process this.
[Bio-Energy: 23%]...Halo notified.
[Current Max Cycle Rate (3:1)| Activate: Yes/No]
That's new.
Cycle mode is only autonomously activated in response to danger or during engagement scenarios.
Non-engagement activation requires manual confirmation.
Jace had several other things to clarify about the development, but the current situation was too fragile for that. He mentally prompted activate, and the world crawled.